ianoid

Where DO you live- what part of the country? That's alot of 2600 to be spilling out in 2004. I see alot of stuff, but the 2600 stuff is just too expensive in the wild around here to bother buying common items. You can get most common to rare (not 'ER') stuff on eBay for $1-$2 anyway- why would I pay a flea market vendor $3 or more for commonish stuff? Awesome load!

Has this been dumped? Did anyone notice that title? I've never seen that it exists. Neat!

I almost wish I'd bought the Quardun just so I could have a fake one (that Best repro I've had for years!) and a real (CPUWiz's lab loaner) one and a released one (bought it in a bundle years back on eBay with an NTSC Obelix- cost alot.) Something stolen, something borrowed, something bid. ian

It should be called the 9 pin controller rarity. That's a pretty ambitious project. I could add maybe 70 controllers you don't have there if I just could get at my poor collection that's back in storage. I've always wanted to have a controller museum online. Keep up the good work! Although I don't see it updated with any of the great pictures people posted. I didn't know CBS sold the stick stand! I have that thing in another package. -ian

Aye, that's one of my favorite game pages. Michael is so flaky though! I've traded with him a couple of times, but I wish it was more- he just disappears for months at a time! Great guy though. Thanks for the link! ian

Gas Hog and Master Builder aren't so great PAL. On eBay they sometimes sell for under $10. I think a reasonable price would be $20. Bumper Bash is rather uncommon PAL and is worth maybe twice those prices PAL, I would surmise. Mangia is quite rare PAL (I would consider it equivalent to a 6 or 7 out of 10), and probably worth $75-$150.) NTSC it's impossible, and the sky's the limit on one of those, although I've yet to see a completely confirmed NTSC copy. If Mangia hit $200 in the past, it's sort of a fluke, because they pop up now and again in PALlands. -ian, and his opinions

Please have a look at the links I added. I'm sure a few of you will have some comments about them. I was just kidding about those Skull Island (i.e. Action Hitech) labels! Those come up now and again, and aren't particularly interesting. This Atari label looks somewhat official. Check out those gloves!

I know about the Action Hi-tech label. You guys need to look at the other cart with the green label. I'll try to upload the pix of that cart that I was sent by the seller so you guys can figure out what I'm talking about. And I know about all the HES labels. What am I, some kind of rank amateur? Kidding! It's the cart second from the right in the bottom row in the close up, and the cart furthest left in the overview picture. It's a green and white label and you can clearly see that it says 'Atari' on it. It isn't a homemade looking label a la Brazil. I'll get ya'll the images the seller sent me. -ian

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?MfcIS...item=8100116654 or search eBay for the 8100116654 I tried to talk the guy into selling the cart to me alone, but no dice. He also sent me some scans. Have you seen that official looking green label? It is not clearly home made- it has an official looking end label. Here are some links to scans: http://home.comcast.net/~ianoid/greenpole1.jpg http://home.comcast.net/~ianoid/greenpole2.jpg -ian

So Marco, did you ever sell the lot? -ian

Let alone one with this much provenance. I haven't had time to play it, but I'm super excited that stuff like this is still being uncovered. If AA would release it on a cart, I'd buy it. Man, Tempest, you must have been soiling yourself when this one fell into your laps. It pays to have THE prototype website- and be as hardworking about it as Mattempest. ian

So who's going to create the 2600 Internet cart and MMOAG (Arcade Game)? My alter ego would then be green block. ian

Some name ideas: The Cablecart Connect-A-Cart Stellawire Flashcart Bushcart (for Nolan Bushnell!) Krokocart The Brewpub The Brewcart or Spacemaster X-7

@Marc That's a great picture of you! Anyone just get their Rock Star bonus or cash in their stock options? Time to liquidate that 401k.

It may be obvious, but I have little confidence in a group of people that aren't bosom buddies getting it together and pulling it off. Do any of you know how much it would cost to rewire or repipe a house? Well, I know it would cost around $30,000 just to outfit our current house with new copper/plastic pipe. Perhaps Marco's would be a little less, but still, he probably deserves more than half that amount for such an incredible collection! Most folks could put in $500-$1500. Not many could handle $5000 for protos! Really, at the $1000 price point, you'd need more than a dozen people. No way that could work. @Tempest- Hey Matt! We should email more- I'd love to hear about your exploits in the world of prototypes. I cherish that CW I got from you. I still would think a lab loaner that says 'Pepsi Invaders' or whatever would be really really really cool. Cooler even then some of the other 'unreleased' games. It's a minor aesthetic thing. I think Hot Rox would be really cool too. That lab loaner label is this weird worshipable plain jane label thing. Anyway, ian

Well, I can say I'm interested in any number of items. As I've stated, I'd love to contribute a bit (more than a grand!) Some other items I'm into: Coke Wins! lab loaner Hot Rox lab loaner Dumbo loaner Donald Duck Loaner 2 in 1's any/both Save Mary pcb Freeway loaner Man, I would be interested in just about anything! I'm flexible, really. Coke Wins is probably one of my favorite. Mahemmers is all over the lot! Well, I can say that there's nothing wrong with a tight collection going from one major collector to the next. Best of luck if you can swing it. If I wasn't married with a kid and another on the way... Yeah, yeah, yeah- excuses.

A dose of reality here boys. Expect the games to average $500 apiece. Some are worth $300, some are worth $1000. A game like Tempest would clearly be a major desire for many/most. I think it would be reasonable for it to fetch $1000-$2000. Of course, it's all moot if Marco doesn't sell or the people can't come together with a group interest or if some crazy person (wish it was me!) gets together an offer Marco can handle. Now it may seem like an easy thing to say, but it's pointless to really try to contribute to a serious group interested in buying the lot unless you have $1000 to spend or something. WAY TOO MUCH MONEY TO BE SPENDING ON OLD VIDEO GAMES. Still, some of us are stupid enough to do it! But you can't expect someone who went through the time and trouble and cash to acquire these items to accept much less than market rate. Can you? And although we all have major desires, if a group came together, flexibility would be paramount. Some items are gonna be wanted be many, and might be a make or break point for most. My view is similar. If I couldn't get the Rabbit Transit cart out of any deal I contributed to, I would pass. Anything else I got on top of that- I'd consider very flexible. I think that putting together a group will be nearly impossible for this reason. The fewer the better, and since I'm not able to contribute $5000 or whatever, I can't expect to be part of a group of less than 10 or 20 coming together. And frankly, I can't see the wrinkles in that ironed out before Marco's pipes burst or his house burns down from an electrical malfunction (which hopefully would not occur in the next 25 years.) We'll see! I still would like to help and be a part of any group deal. I suspect I would be among the least demanding of the lot.

If some of you are putting together a group to buy the protos, I'd be happy to join in. I can't contribute a ton, but my main interest is in one or two titles. Primarily, I'm interested in Rabbit Transit, which I actually found locally. I traded it to John Earney, who sold it to Marco (wish he'd contact me instead!) I'm really dying to recover this proto, and reintegrate it into my collection as one of my best individual finds ever. So if you want another party in the group (I am very flexible, although I would clearly need to get RT to bother), please contact me by email (ianoid at ianoid dot com) or PM me (better on the DP board which I frequent, whereas I'm only here rarely.) Any items I bought would be up for public dumpage and inspection, unless specified by the purchasing group. -ian

Has anyone confirmed that they exist in cartridge (or any) form for the Atari computers? I definitely have found several copies of each game complete for Commodore-64, but never heard of or seen confirmation of the titles for Atari 8-bit. ian

Stevie Nicks is the funniest thing I've ever seen on Atari Age. Thanks for the yucks. ian

The answer is a resounding, echoing, NO. Anybody into CDI is cheap enough to realize that paying more than $1 apiece is highway robbery. I accumulated CDI for a little while. When I decided to unload the lot, I had trouble selling them at $2 apiece in a bundle on eBay. Finally I paid shipping to send them to a friend. Heavy pieces of crap. I'm sure there are some CDI fanatics, and there are a couple of games that have value, but the other 75 or whatever are C R A P. ian, down on CDI, but less down on 3D0

Clearly it's a Compusole. ian

The best Thrift Stores HAVE policies about employee purchases. ALL the best ones. Otherwise, it's 90% skimming and you get to see the garbage. The ones without policies that protect the customers have a very high likelihood of sucking. And Goodwill in California sucks eggs. I noticed recently that when I went from Big Lots to Goodwill, they are starting to look the same. Cheap hazardous waste detergents, overprices cell phone accessories, overstock flavor of the week valentines and card games (matrix card game! no, star wars card game! no, harry potter valentines.) Blecccch. Big difference from the Goodwill system in Seattle, which has serious HR and bigtime employee purchase policies. Also a harbinger of thrift store doom is the LOL (little old lady) run place. That means that only things that an LOL thinks are worth selling make it. Falling into this category are many of the American Cancer Society and mom and pop local one store shops. Hmmm... Seems like a topic for my DP column. Thanks guys!

Oh my god! Where have you been? Disappeared in a puff of smoke? We missed you. ian

I hope he didn't get called into duty in Israel. I have your Spy vs. Spy games Nir! Please drop me a note. ian